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June 9, 2009
House of the Day: 1809 Glenwood Road
It takes a little vision to look past some of the aesthetics of this listing at 1809 Glenwood Road, but if you look closely you can see the downers are mostly skin deep. Remove the tacky furniture and occasional strip of track lighting, and this three-bedroom house would show pretty nicely. It's got some very nice bones in the form of front-hall columns, fireplaces and built-in cabinetry. Not so sure about the price though: It's asking $1,275,000. Reactions?
1809 Glenwood Road [Ditmas Estates] GMAP P*Shark
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Comments
Great House from the outside - needs updating
the price is nutso!
I'd say it sells for 899K
Posted by: gemini10 at June 9, 2009 1:21 PM
This is that middle income neighborhood right?
Posted by: dittoburg at June 9, 2009 1:30 PM
Broken record here, but the sellers in Ditmas are particularly reluctant to glance at a calendar and realize it will never be 2007 again. I don't know why that neighborhood in particular, but that is the case. The only people cutting prices in Ditmas either have to sell or have had the property on the market forever and are getting antsy. It's a great neighborhood but right now it's frozen up tight. I am looking at the same listings I was seeing in December, except for the few that have been yanked off the market.
All that said, it's a cute house with lots of potential, although it is small for that neck of the woods. I don't see it going for more than $1 million, not needing that kind of work and not on Glenwood.
Posted by: gidgetgoesbrooklyn at June 9, 2009 1:32 PM
Lopping off $400k might stir up some interest.
Posted by: SnarkSlope at June 9, 2009 1:37 PM
broker describes the price as a "mere pittance"!
http://www.danshapirorealestate.net/Listing/ViewListingDetails.aspx?ListingID=2865084&ShowCompact=false&Preview=false&new=false&LastTabIndex=-1&BackEmailID=-1&BackEmailTypeID=NONE
Posted by: the chicken at June 9, 2009 1:45 PM
I take back my remark about it being small -- it is 3200 sq feet and six bedrooms, not 3 as it says in Mr. B's post, although this listing is so fantastical I do not necessarily trust the broker not to list a walk-in closet or some such as a bedroom.
It still needs a lot of work. The days when people would pay over $1.2M for "needs a lot of work" in Ditmas are gone.
Posted by: gidgetgoesbrooklyn at June 9, 2009 1:51 PM
Price is waay too high.
Posted by: bridges at June 9, 2009 1:52 PM
I think the master bedroom had a trampoline in the photo on the realtor's website
Posted by: gemini10 at June 9, 2009 1:54 PM
Dude!! (yes, I just said Dude)
1.275 Mil for a house in Ditmas Park?
Those columns are hella cheesey (yes, I just said hella)
Posted by: MoneyForNothing at June 9, 2009 1:55 PM
If I had a million bucks to spend and was willing to fix skin-deep aesthetics, I'd head a few blocks east:
http://corcoran.com/property/listing.aspx?ListingID=1280225&Region=NYC&OhDat=;
Posted by: tonewlots at June 9, 2009 1:58 PM
one listing says 3 bedrooms, another says 6 bedrooms? either way the price is way to high. that PPS house a few months back sold for this price and was in much better condition.
Posted by: bkny at June 9, 2009 2:02 PM
Nice touches on the staging for the photos. In addition to the trampoline, there are the rags and file folders strewn around the kitchen counter. In the 2nd floor bedroom the kid's guitar and clothes are laying around.
Not sure who's more of a lazy idiot - the seller or the broker - for not doing 5 minutes of tidying up before taking the photos.
Posted by: Bklnite at June 9, 2009 2:03 PM
I'm with you tonewlots - definitely prefer the one that you posted. Note that one also has a double lot so much larger garden than most others in the area.
Still, that one has been on the market for well over a year with no action so maybe there's something wrong with that one as well?
Posted by: the chicken at June 9, 2009 2:06 PM
This price is insane! I understand that Brooklyn is not Iowa, Jersey or Pennsylvania but could you imagine showing someone from one of those places a picture of this house and telling them what is was selling for, then describing the neighborhood of Ditmas as an oasis just a couple blocks from bustling Coney Island Ave. The Iowans would think we were all high!
Posted by: bklynmommy at June 9, 2009 2:07 PM
My hood and have to agree, too much $$$ for this house. It's a great little nook that's more of Midwood than Ditmas Park and very quiet and convinient location to the B&Q trains and stores but still too much for what is it.
Posted by: Kensingtonian at June 9, 2009 2:17 PM
If your quality of life is largely determined by your proximity to places to eat and shop, you might not be happy here. If you want or need six decent-sized bedrooms, though, it makes sense. I really like the streets with landscaped medians, like Glenwood and East 17th. That said, I don't think they'll get much over $1 million, if that.
Minor point - it's not Ditmas Park, or 'Ditmas,' whatever that is. This is Midwood Park, which despite the name is part of Flatbush. Kind of like how Kansas City is in Missouri.
Posted by: Sparafucile at June 9, 2009 2:28 PM
Even for a 6 bedroom, the lack of rental income versatility in a one-family stand-alone like this combined with a so-so neighborhood makes asking for anything over a mil too much.
Posted by: Joe from Brooklyn at June 9, 2009 2:32 PM
Doesn't a true Victorian require a tower-like corner? Not much in the way of any Victorian-style architectural details.
Posted by: Joe from Brooklyn at June 9, 2009 2:40 PM
Yes, the price is $200K to high in this market, considering the work that needs to be done, the lack of a front porch (that brick is not original) and the location (far from Cortelyou, even Newkirk, not to mention the Park).
However, some of the above posters are really out of touch. The columns are tacky only if you think original detail is tacky. Traditionally, houses in DP turn over every 30 years = when the family is through needing a family sized home. People are not going to sell out here unless they have to - i.e., hit hard times. I wouldn't say owners are out of touch - I'd say they just don't have to sell for the most part. Dp has pretty much always marched to the beat of its own drummer. Don't see that changing now. Also - most of these families are single family - can't chop it up into illegal multi-family dwellings.
Posted by: Architerrorist at June 9, 2009 2:47 PM
Hate being the naysayer here, but this house looks more Borough Park than Ditmas Park.
Posted by: Joe from Brooklyn at June 9, 2009 2:58 PM
Archi,
isn't the requirement to keep it single-family then the issue?
I could take an entire block, turn it into one giant mansion and sell it for $10m. It would be relatively cheap on a per square foot basis but it would simply be unaffordable for most people.
Posted by: the chicken at June 9, 2009 3:07 PM
"Although the general public often incorrectly refers to a Victorian era house as a Victorian "style" house, Victorian era refers to a time period and not to a style. Although architectural historians generally agree that there are about eight primary architectural styles prominent in the United States and Canada during the Victorian era, Victorian-era residential architecture in the United States and Canada was a procession of styles borrowed from every country and every era in history." Though I stand corrected, I still would want a @!%$^&# porch and whimsical tower!
Posted by: Joe from Brooklyn at June 9, 2009 3:08 PM
Most of Victorian Flatbush was developed after Queen Victoria's death in 1901. Maybe it should be renamed Edwardian Flatbush.
Posted by: Sparafucile at June 9, 2009 3:21 PM
LMAO! Good luck selling at that price, chump!
A few month ago, 4 blocks away, this charming little house colonial house sold for $481K:
http://www.brownstoner.com/brownstoner/archives/2009/02/2777_bedford_av.php
http://www.brooklynproperties.com/house136.htm
Some people never wake up!
Posted by: stringer at June 9, 2009 3:26 PM
Much as I believe prices are still too high, that house is not even close to being comparable stringer.
This would be a better comp:
http://www.trulia.com/homes/New_York/Brooklyn/sold/20889852-490-E-24th-St-Brooklyn-NY-11210
Posted by: the chicken at June 9, 2009 3:35 PM
To each its own, Chicken. Bring down your own comps, folks!
I think it's nutz to pay so much dough to leave so far down in Brooklyn.
Posted by: stringer at June 9, 2009 3:43 PM
The house is in the landmarked Fiske Terrace-Midwood park Historic District. Glenwood Road is part of Flatbush Malls, with a planted median down the middle. It's probably 6 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, hence the discrepancy of numbers across various sources.
My guess: $1.1M.
Posted by: Xris at June 9, 2009 4:36 PM
I like the name Edwardian Flatbush, has an implication of ostentatious grandeur
Posted by: dittoburg at June 9, 2009 4:49 PM
Does anyone know when these homes were built? My guess is that it would have to be turn-of-the-century.
"Before it was incorporated into Brooklyn City in 1894, Flatbush described both the Town of Flatbush, incorporating a large swath of central Kings County extending east to the Queens County border, and the Village of Flatbush, formerly the heart of the current community. Many of the remaining early Dutch structures are in the Flatlands and Marine Park neighborhoods."- Wikipedia
Posted by: Joe from Brooklyn at June 9, 2009 5:22 PM
These houses were mostly built in the first decade of the twentieth century when what was then farmland was subdivided. The Village of Flatbush, centered around the intersection of Flatbush and Church avenues, dates from the mid-17th century and still has a couple of 18th century buildings - the Flatbush Reformed Dutch Church and Erasmus Hall Academy.
Posted by: Sparafucile at June 9, 2009 6:00 PM
I grew up in Marine Park and remember the Wykoff-Bennett House on Kings Highway and the old farm-house on East 36th Street bet. Fillmore and Ave S. There are a few others in the Marine Park, Madison, and Midwood. Great examples of colonial-era Dutch architecture. http://www.brownstoner.com/brownstoner/archives/marine_park/
Posted by: Joe from Brooklyn at June 9, 2009 6:10 PM
Stringer - you can't get a house (a house, not an apt.) for this price closer to Manhattan - not in a half-way gentrified neighborhood, whatever that's worth. Prices are fair considering you can't get anything with nearly as much space for less than $500k more closer in (in a desirable nabe).
Posted by: Architerrorist at June 9, 2009 8:01 PM
I will say, given the plethora of gorgeous exteriors in DP, this house is far from pristine and definitely lacking in curb appeal, IMO. I agree... thanks to the "renovations", much more BP than DP. Although BP had some nice Victorians at one time, too... entire nabes with swanky names to match Ditmas Park. Those enclaves just didn't survive... In fact, there were many such nabes throughout mid and southern Brooklyn. You see the random Victorian house here and there, and forget that they were often part of a much grander neighborhood of Victorian homes that simply did not stand the test of time...
Posted by: Architerrorist at June 9, 2009 8:03 PM
Is the picture on the right above the viewing room for the body, or just where you sign the guestbook? Sheesh this looks like a funeral home. Once again a mediocre house in a medicore neighborhood asking Beverly Hills prices. In the real workd, this is a $200K house.
Posted by: williamsburgguy at June 9, 2009 9:53 PM
No, I think 200K is way too much for a 6 bedroom stand alone house near a subway in NYC Williamsburgguy.
Posted by: Joe from Brooklyn at June 9, 2009 10:16 PM
I totally agree Joe (and I'm being serious). I gave less than 100K for my house in Williamsburg not all that long ago in real estate land. 10 years ago - before owing a house became like playing the stock market and driving these prices up to ridiculous levels - what would this mediocre house have gone for? 10 years ago in the rest of America it would have been a 180K house that today is worth MAYBE 200K. I remember when you could buy just about anywhere here in the city near a subway for a normal America price plus about $50K. 10 years ago NYC wasn't all that expensive a place to live. The city hasn't changed much except for the price.
Posted by: williamsburgguy at June 9, 2009 11:16 PM
The owner's taste may not be the latest thing, but this house is very well maintained and needs no work at all.
Posted by: mopar at June 9, 2009 11:28 PM
Yeah, you could buy a 3 bedroom house for 35 - 45K in the early seventies like my parents did in Marine Park for example. But until we hit some kind of hyper-deflation in this country (which I as an aspiring homeowner kind of hope we do) that 45K house is 500K. This house which was probably 60ish back then is 900 - Mil. Unless deflation increases at a historically unprecedented level that's more or less today's market.
Posted by: Joe from Brooklyn at June 9, 2009 11:37 PM
Williiamsburg was very industrial in the past. Not really a place where homes were particularly expensive. I thinks it's unfair to compare a completely transformed area like Williamsburg to Flatbush which because of the quiet and suburban aesthetics was for most of its history considered an attractive place to live rather than an industrial area like Williamsburg or Hell's Kitchen,;places that besides workmen who made their living in the factories and certain ethnic groups,no one wanted to live.
Posted by: Joe from Brooklyn at June 9, 2009 11:44 PM
The average says $938k but the distribution is skewed lower than that. Is it time to show the median guess as well?
Posted by: the chicken at June 10, 2009 6:18 AM
Stop comparing NYC to the rest of the country. It's not and never will be. Who cares what a house costs in Iowa. This ain't Iowa! Go back to middle America, if you're looking for a cheap house. For a house of this size, in a reasonable neighborhood, you are going to pay a high price for the pleasure of space and proximity to Manhattan. This is true even in the NYC suburbs. Houses are not cheap in the more desirable suburbs, either.
Yes, prices reflect market changes, but a house in DP, even a wreck, is not going to go for $200k, unless maybe we have a nuclear winter or some such catastrophe.
DP is one of the few relatively affordable family neighborhoods in Brooklyn, even at these prices. Families traditionally priced out of PS, BH, CG, etc... tend to look in Ditmas and Lefferts, the two areas with decent housing stock, proximity to the Park and the Slope (kid activities and schools).... This is a world Williamsburg hipsters have yet to confront. Although about 5 years ago, The Village Voice did a little piece on DP and described it as the place where "aging hipsters go to retire." I think they meant "breed."
Posted by: Architerrorist at June 10, 2009 7:50 AM
williamsburgguy - your viewing room comment made my spill my coffee
Posted by: dittoburg at June 10, 2009 9:18 AM
This is priced too high. I live in the neighborhood and I don't think it's worth it - would need to be in perfect shape to get that price.
Posted by: bklyn_girl at June 10, 2009 11:43 PM
First, thank you to Brownstoner for putting my property on their forum.
Brooklyn real estate is really very simple. The long term trend is more people want to live in the NYC metro area than there is space for. This is probably because of the relatively high incomes available and the intense cultural life of the city.
So it boils down to Location, location , location, greater Ditmas Park (Midwood Park)is relatively close to the city, has very good transportation and good schools. There is also a tremendous community spirit, which could be seen by over 100 volunteers running the very successful Victorian House Tour. Because of the restrictive zoning in greater Ditmas Park, a.k.a. Victorian Flatbush, there are still numerous 40 and 50 by one hundred lots. These size lots are fast disappearing from other neighborhoods.
While the temporary economic situation may have slowed home sales. The above factors plus any inflation that we may have ( The gov't is printing money like crazy) makes this house a tremendous buy right now, especially if you intend to live in the house for many years.
Lastily, I ask the commentors to be kind, this house represents the owners nest egg. Would you like it if someone ran down your property just because they thought it was witty? Please write responsibly
Posted by: dshapusa at June 16, 2009 1:10 PM
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